Main New Rules As The Plot Demands Discussion

Which episode is the second Pokemon anime example from (where Ghost types are weak to Psychic attacks, rather than vice-versa)? I want to clarify if it is an actual mistake rather than the Pokemon being weak to it anyways (example: Gastly's evolution family) and it just got dubbed badly or whatever.

MagBas

02:25:39 AM Feb 13th 2015edited by MagBas

Of the description:"This is not about the differences between rules in a work and rules in a game it's based on (The former will often be inherited from the latter), but when the rules of a work don't make sense and violate their own internal logic. " In either case, the episode in question is "The Psychic Sidekicks!"

LiefKatano

05:13:48 AM Feb 13th 2015

And it does. The page says that normally, Ghost-types are "generally portrayed as strong to Psychic-types". Since I didn't know the context, I thought it was someone used, say, Confusion on a Ghost-type and it was shown to hurt the Ghost a lot or something, rather than what it actually was (Psychic-types being good at warding off Ghost-types).

I'm still torn as to whether or not it is an example, though - reading the episode's description just seems to imply that Psychic-types are able to keep them away somehow (using Psychic powers to sense the ghosts? It's the anime, anything can happen), rather than actually offer an advantage over them. I haven't seen all of the episodes of the anime, so I don't know whether or not warding off Ghost-types would violate anime logic or not.

Looking through all of the YGO examples, almost all of them are not this trope. The only ones that are are Time Wizard and Maiku. Some of the examples are mentioning "real rules", while others are asking how you could do that without holograms. You couldn't - and who cares, because holograms are always used when these rules are used. Yes, even the Catapult Turtle/Castle thing is not this trope.

That being said, there are plenty of YGO examples of this trope - notably, when a card has its effect changed to match its real-world counterpart. Mirror Force used to also damage the opponent. Midway through the series, it stopped doing that to match the real card. That's this trope. Most of the YGO section is not.

Any objections to removing most of it and replacing it with appropriate examples?

Cripple Mr Onion (CMO) is a card game in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. The rules are never listed, and the game is assumed to be common enough knowledge that anyone who plays cards at all knows how to play CMO. However, the game is a significant plot point in "Witches Abroad", and shows up insignificantly in a few other books (such as "Interesting Times", where it is played with tiles in a Japanese-themed empire, like mahjong). Does CMO qualify? It's difficult to find an example of two rules in direct contradiction with each other, which would prove that Pratchett is making up CMO as he goes along. It is, however, well within Pratchett's style and sense of humor to create a game in which the rules slowly evolve between players or in which

There are also chess-variants; one called "Thud", and one called "Stealth Chess". The rules for these are incomplete, but they don't show up often and, thus, rarely have an opportunity to gain new rules. A "Thud" match, however, plays a major role in the plot of the book of the same name.

The best example would be the unnamed game the Gods play with the fates of men. There are long scenes of gods rolling dice, making moves and other things game-related, and the rules again are never listed, but actions taken by the gods show them to either be incredibly complex, or made up on the spot. “Gods play games with the fates of men. But first they have to get all the pieces on the board and look all over the place for the dice.” —"Soul Music"

I'm an avid fan, having re-read the discworld books many times over, but there are many of them and I will need help if we're going to add this as an example on the main page.

rainwalker2k3

08:40:45 PM Aug 22nd 2012edited by rainwalker2k3

oh, and I realize the site is called tvtropes, but I think if we include tabletop RP Gs, then literature is not too big of a leap. Also, pratchett has been adapted for the screen, silver or otherwise.

Telcontar

01:14:44 AM Aug 23rd 2012

This site started as TV since it sprang from a Buffy board if I understand correctly, but it has since expanded to all forms of media, and has a lot of literature.

Correct me if I am wrong, but Catapult Turtle affects the opponents hit points directly for half of the sacrificed monsters attack power.
And if I remember correctly, at the point of the battle that Yugi sacrifices Gaia the Dragon Champion his opponent had 1300 or less hit points, so Yugi would have won following the rules anyway.

RoshinDragoness

11:12:19 PM Nov 28th 2011

The CTFCG occurred during the Duelist Kingdom arc, at which point the rules had not been solidified to match up with the RL card game. Previous uses of the Catapult Turtle in the show had, IIRC, targeted monsters. So Yugi's use of it in the manner he did was rather unexpected and did not fit with the limited info viewers had been given as to the rules of Duel Monsters.

Can someone PLEASE change the name back to "Screw The Rules, I Have Plot!"?

The new title is frustrating

DominusTemporis

12:12:17 PM Sep 24th 2011

We could always go one further and get back the original, fun title...

RoshinDragoness

11:08:49 PM Nov 28th 2011

The original was fun, but a little too out there for a good title. But "Screw The Rules, I Have Plot" was a perfect blend of clarity and humor. SPOON are a bunch of retards if they can't see that.

DominusTemporis

01:49:29 PM Feb 9th 2012

They are anyway. I think we've established that repeatedly throughout this wiki.

Sevly

03:48:09 PM Jun 20th 2012

One more for "Screw The Rules, I Have Plot". Clearly the hatred for snowclones is misplaced if we're throwing out clear yet funny titles like that.

corruptmalemenace

04:59:36 PM Sep 6th 2012

I for one was considerably less confused when it was "screw the rules, I have plot." This trope is about "Breaking established rules for narrative convenience (or from ignorance)." (taken from Laconic wiki). In other words, it's literally where the author says "Screw the (previously established, if fictional) rules, I will do this anyway because I have plot-based reasons to do so!" The new title doesn't get that across. "New Rules as the plot demands" implies the exact opposite - "Screw the fact that Action X is not established as being against the rules, I'm going to add a new rule forbidding it so as to retain plot tension!"

In short, either the title or the Laconic description is obviously inaccurate and needs to change.

This are things not controled by rules. The powers of the pokemons are supposed to be natural, not thanks to rules.

75.33.216.97

05:05:16 AM Aug 31st 2010

Except that there are rules about what Pokémon can and can't do, and these examples broke them. Swellow had been hit by Thunderbolt in other episodes, and the result was exactly what you'd think.

MagBas

10:39:07 AM Aug 31st 2010

Not, the abilities of the pokemon are NOT defined by game rules or the like in-universe. They have natural abilities and weaknesses that are used by humans in fights, but they have said abilities in the wild, the humans not define they. The result of Swellow be hit by a lightning is not governed by game rules.

cassius335

04:14:56 PM Aug 31st 2010edited by cassius335

That's not strictly true. The anime has both the same element system and the same moves as the game. The humans don't define those rules, but they're still there. In other words, the "natural abilities and weaknesses" ARE the rules.

As to the specific examples: Notice both Rhydon's horn being a weak-point to electric attacks and someone's pokemon using electricity as armour both show up ONCE and are never used again after the episodes in question.

MagBas

05:31:59 PM Aug 31st 2010edited by MagBas

This trope is to inconcistency between game rules, not to any breaking of Magic A Is Magic A when the things broken are NOT supposed to be controled by game rules in-universe. Yes, they are based in out-of-universe game rules, but in-universe they are so close to game rules when the Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors in Naruto or the Nen System in Hunter × Hunter.

cassius335

03:05:24 PM Sep 11th 2010

Um... There is, in-universe, a game.... Pokemon Battling. It has rules. It shouldn't be disqualified from this trope just because the rules were, in-universe, put there by Nature and figured out by humans later. THEYRE STILL THE RULES.

And what the hell are you on about with that last sentence?

MagBas

04:35:00 PM Sep 15th 2010edited by MagBas

As noted, this is defined by the nature, not by games rules. The rules of pokemon battling not include none of the abilities of the pokemons- to effects of comparation, said game looks like to have one number of rules not greater than more martial arts championships in animes(considering that the fighters are encased in pokeballs). By the way, about the last sentence, the Nen System is, like the pokemon element system, used in championships and the like, and was researched,not defined by rules of said games, but at same time is more artificial than the pokemon element system-(more techniques were designed by humans, only the basics are really "natural") . If someone did something that contradicts the already established rules of the Nen System in some moment, you will put Hunter × Hunter here?

Cag

06:57:43 PM Sep 20th 2010edited by Cag

But this nature is obviously supposed to be identical to the games' Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors, as the characters mention it regularly. Mistakes, like the one with Rock type in the first season don't change that(again assuming this wasn't a dub error). Now, adapting the turn based combat from the games into real time combat in the anime means that there will be things in the anime that you can't do in the games, but that isn't the problem. The problem is that the anime sometimes ignores the rule that it established just because the plot demands it. In other words, Pikachu's electric attacks damaging Blaine's Rhydon because Pikachu attacked the horn or Brock's Geodude and Onix because Pikachu was supercharged is fine. Plusle and Minun's electric attacks damaging Dawn's Mamoswine for no apparent reason is not. And it's not just immunities, though those stick out the most. How many times were Pokemon in good shape, sometimes never taking a single hit before, defeated by attack they're supposed to resist, or even doubly resist? How many times Pokemon shurged off multiple super effective attacks(though that is probably more of a Worf Barrage)? That said, those aren't really rules, maybe we need another trope(or maybe a new one) to describe it?

MagBas

03:51:27 PM Sep 24th 2010edited by MagBas

If the anime breaks one rule that it already established this counts as Plot Hole pure and simple. If one pokemon which Ground-type was already mentioned in the anime is hurt by electricity, as the immunity to electricity of the Ground-type already was mentioned in the anime, this really counts as one Plot Hole. If, however this is not the case ( As with one large chunk of the secondary types in the pokemons in each generation) then this is not one case of Plot Hole, but can be one of Adaptation Decay.

cassius335

05:42:01 PM Nov 2nd 2010

Mag Bas, as far as I'm aware, neither Hunter X Hunter or Naruto were orginally Gameboy games, so those aren't fair examples at all. Pokemon is, more or less, the anime of the games, with an Elemental Rock Papers Scissors system they don't always get right.

And that system (among othor things) the rules what everyone not you is trying to refer to. It doesn't matter whether the rules were made up by humans or exist as "natural abilities". Just because Ash doesn't keep his Pikachu on the current Nintendo handheld or in his card deck shouldn't disqualify Pokemon from this trope.

If Pikachu electrocutes a Ground-type, it's not a difference between anime and game, it's an error, deliberate or otherwise. Charmeleon evolving again into Charizard in two episodes is a difference, because Pokemon evolving at a certain level got abandoned quite quickly (indeed, XP levels got mentioned all of once and were never heard from again).

MagBas

06:38:34 PM Nov 2nd 2010edited by MagBas

"This is not about the tie-in game in relation to the In Universe game. The game within the fiction is subjected to its own set of rules, and not correlating perfectly with its Real Life counterpart is not this trope. "

I yet remembers that existed one discussion in the old archived discussion page(when the page yet was The Catapult Flying Turtle Gambit) where they questioned the inclusion of Pokemon here. One argument used, if i remembers well, was something as this "is the same thing than complain that in the movie of one First-Person Shooter the characters die with one shot if in the game they survive lots of shots before of die"

Yes, this disqualifies. Exists one lot of examples in The Anime of the Game. This is so close to one "error" or "rule breaking" as if any one of said examples "broke" the "rules" of their respective games.

cassius335

12:59:41 PM Nov 5th 2010

You keep throwing that paragraph in our faces, but what you seem to mean is "Mag Bas don't care how much the anime inherited fom the game, Mag Bas doesn't want the example here." It's not your descision alone what belong here and what doesn't.

The Pokemon Anime does have it's own rules, no-ones arguing that, but a LOT of those rules - the Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors system, the available moves - are inherited from the game. They have to be, so it's recognisable from the game.

Can you even recognise what's supposed to be the same? Because as far as I can tell, you seem to think "it's the anime, so it's different".... which shows a spectacular ignorance for the example in question.

MagBas

02:31:34 PM Nov 6th 2010edited by MagBas

The problem is that in the anime they are NOT rules of one GAME. The description of the trope turns clear that the fact of be based in the rules of one real life game is meaningless( the real life game is only mentioned in the description of the trope to say that this trope is not about the inconsistency between the real life game and the in universe game or to compare this with Gretzky Has the Ball ) - and considering as the "rules" are treated in-universe as being so close to game rules as the "rules" in Hunter × Hunter, this not belongs here.

cassius335

06:27:28 PM Jan 27th 2011

Of COURSE it's a game, you prat. When it stops being a game, that's when you get the no-powers brawl (and badly mangled moral) from the first movie.

If it's not a game, what is it?

MagBas

06:46:36 PM Jan 27th 2011edited by MagBas

This are natural powers and abilities used in one game-but that not need of the rules of said game to exist neither are said rules that say as they work. Guess! You guess that the powers of wild pokemon(that definitively are not playing this game created by humans) are different of the Trainer's pokemon in the anime?

KJMackley

02:14:51 AM Jul 6th 2011

Looking the trope over, it has evolved slightly to not just include Gaming Anime-type inconsistencies but also when it's pretty obvious certain rules (laws, weaknesses, strengths, technology, magic and other basic world-building practices) are being made up to facilitate the plot. If "the Horn" has never been hinted at in previous encounters with the same Pokemon as being a weak point, then it probably fits.

Of course, as it has been said Pokemon battles would be dependant on the training given to the animals like you would for any sport activity. It's not unreasonable to think that a Pokemon could be trained to minimize a weakness, or that they might be unusually weak to a particular attack due to the lack of training. Wasn't that part of the basis behind the first Pikachu vs. Raichu battle? Raichu evolved too quickly to learn some attacks that Pikachu knew.

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